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Welsh Mutton Chops

A dish of Welsh mutton chops seasoned with coarse sea salt and pepper, served with gravy or fried in veal/beef fat.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 78,219 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Welsh Mutton Chops

Ingredients

Directions

Grill the chops

  1. Cut the chops from the neck of Welsh mutton, keeping the fat intact.

  2. Broil the chops over a sharp fire for about ten minutes.

  3. Sprinkle with pepper and coarse sea salt, avoiding scorching.

  4. Serve on hot plates with their own gravy, without adding butter or sauces.

Make the fried version

  1. For fried mutton chops, mix flour with enough milk to make a smooth paste and add a beaten egg.

  2. Dip the hot chops into the batter and fry in top fat for about five minutes.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Mutton + vealtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,394 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-nonanal (fatty, waxy).

  3. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Mutton + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together5,442 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  5. Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Flour and milk barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 78,219 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Welsh mutton chops
Provide the meat and fat that carry the flavour and juiciness of the dish.
Flour
Forms a smooth batter that coats the chops and crisps when fried.
Egg
Binds the flour and milk into a batter that sets around the chops.
Top fat from veal or beef soups
Conducts heat for frying and adds richness and browning to the coating.

The step that matters

Avoid scorching when broiling. Over a sharp fire the outside of the chops can burn before the centre cooks through. Keeping the fat intact and watching the heat helps the surface brown evenly without charring.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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